Friday, June 19, 2009

I've stayed pretty quiet on this issue as there are a number of other motorsport bloggers who are far more knowledgeable and insightful about it than I am. Let me just just share a few of my opinions on it...

F1 has been pretty entertaining the last couple of seasons, although the novelty of Brawn GP winning everything will ultimately wear off. I worry that one way or another, F1 is going to get boring again.

Max Mosley disgusts me. Everything he does, and every way he does it, I find offensive. If a shake-up in F1 is what it takes to depose the shrivelled old goat then bring it on, I say.

A breakaway championship sounds all well and good, but 16 cars maketh not a particularly good race. However, if the championship is able to give a greater share of TV revenue to teams, it might actually be a cheaper option to get into a series with a higher budget cap but higher income than to go to the FIA's tightly-capped F1.

Does this offer an amazing opportunity to the A1GP blokes to finally get something out of their massive spend? Sell it, with its schedule, contracts, staff and assets, to FOTA and BOOM, instant championship.

I'd love to see more teams involved in F1. Back in 1991 I went to the British Grand Prix on the Friday and there were so many teams that there was a pre-qualifying session involving no-hopers like Fondmetal, Lamborghini and Coloni - 34 cars in total!

The breakaway (which we'll call the "Grand Prix World Championship" for shits and giggles) could potentially run at tracks which have left, are leaving, or are threatened with ejection from F1, such as Montreal, Silverstone, Magny Cours, Indianapolis, Hockenheim, Imola and Fuji, since the GPWC is likely to offer more favourable terms to those track promoters than Ecclestone. It goes without saying that the GPWC would be unable to race at current F1 venues...

However, these tracks face a serious issue - if they sign up to host a GPWC race, the FIA would almost certainly pull other FIA championships from those tracks - WTCC, FIA GT, and Formula 2 for example. This could affect "classic venues" like Silverstone and Imola, as well as GP-ready tracks like Brno, Portimao, Valencia and Oschersleben.

The FIA ultimately sanctions ALL worldwide motorsport, via national ASNs, and if an ASN provides local sanctioning for the GPWC they themselves could face retaliation from the FIA. I see this as being the potential ultimate undoing of the GPWC. I think they'll struggle to find any promoters, tracks or ASNs willing to go against the FIA.

The FIA is threatening legal action to FOTA teams. Fucking idiots. How about compromising on TV revenues and paying back revenue owed to teams in order to keep the lines of communication open? Any sane person would continue to work on resolving this. It seems to me that Mosley and Ecclestone are consumed by their thirst for power and influence rather than acting like motorsport management professionals. If this situation does anything, I hope it brings these two dickheads down to earth with a bang.